Colleagues of Dr. Robert K. McIntyre, who died Thursday in an apparent scuba diving accident in Florida, remembered the veteran physician and hospital administrator on Friday as “a clinician at heart” who was dedicated to patient care and served as a mentor to the doctors and nurses he worked with.

“He cared about patients and he cared about people,” said Dr. Jessica Viola, director of hospitalist medicine at South Shore Hospital in Weymouth, where McIntyre served as chief of medicine. “He always spent a lot of time getting to know people, and he remembered the important things about people’s lives.”

McIntyre’s body was recovered late Thursday afternoon after he went missing in Lake Worth Lagoon in Palm Beach County, the US Coast Guard said. He was found about 75 feet below the surface and about a mile from the original diving location, said Coast Guard Petty Officer Ryan Estrada in an e-mail Friday.

A Coast Guard officer will conduct a preliminary investigation into the scuba diving fatality, Estrada said.

McIntyre, 58, came to work at South Shore in 2012 as a hospitalist — a physician who treats inpatients — and went on to become medical director for the Division of Hospital Medicine, then chairman of the Department of Medicine, the hospital said in a statement.

Dr. Peter Paul, associate medical director at South Shore Hospital, said the region’s medical community “has lost a giant.”

“He was open, welcoming, and had a disarming personality where no matter what specialty you’re in, you felt comfortable in Bob’s presence,” Paul said. “He had an open-door policy where not only us in the division of medicine but even surgeons and other specialists could go into his office and discuss whatever problem or issue may be on the table.”

McIntyre’s dedication to his patients extended to his colleagues. Viola said McIntyre worked hard to improve conditions for the doctors and nurses in his unit.

“Burnout is a thing that can easily happen in a hospital setting,” she said. “We have a much larger number of clinicians now, and the division has a much better reputation thanks in large part to the ideas and strategies that he had. … He was a real partner, and that extended to his [role as] chief of medicine.”

Before the coronavirus pandemic, McIntyre would invite dozens of his colleagues for an annual gathering at his home, where they would usually play a game of “medical trivia” that he prepared. The game was designed for “a room full of doctors who think they know everything,” Viola joked. She said McIntyre had been talking recently about planning another gathering this spring.

“I think Bob’s humor and his overall social personality kind of opened the door for him to bring people together and build relationships, which I think transcended into an overall improvement in patient care,” Paul said.

Outside of work, McIntyre enjoyed the outdoors and traveling with his family, his colleagues said.

Attempts to reach his family were unsuccessful Friday.

McIntyre was on a diving trip arranged by the Jupiter Dive Center when the captain of the Republic IV notified the Coast Guard around 10:30 a.m. Thursday that the doctor had not surfaced from the Lake Worth Lagoon, officials said Friday.

An employee who answered the phone at Jupiter Dive Center on Friday said the company had no comment about the doctor’s death.

“That family has to deal with what they need to deal with right now and it would be unfair for us to have any comment,” said the employee, who said her name is Lisa but declined to share her last name.

Crew members on the Republic IV “noticed he was missing after he did not resurface with fellow divers after a 45-minute dive,” said Estrada, the Coast Guard petty officer, on Friday.

The report from the dive boat triggered a search-and-rescue effort involving the Coast Guard and the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Department, which deployed divers to McIntyre’s last known location.

The sheriff’s office said in a statement that its Marine Unit and helicopter had assisted the Coast Guard in the search and found the diver on the ocean floor around 3 p.m.

The medical examiner’s office took possession of McIntyre’s body at Dubois Park in Jupiter and will conduct an autopsy to determine the cause of death, according to the sheriff’s office.

John R. Ellement can be reached at john.ellement@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @JREbosglobe. Nick Stoico can be reached at nick.stoico@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @NickStoico. Emily Sweeney can be reached at emily.sweeney@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @emilysweeney and on Instagram @emilysweeney22.